The Nix(165)

“These two hate each other so much,” Faye said. “They’re using their kitchen like America used Vietnam.”

“That TV you’re watching,” Samuel said, “it wasn’t here the first time I visited. I’m pretty sure of it.”

Faye didn’t respond. She stared blankly forward. For a full minute. During which she watched a clip of the husband kicking a panel of drywall, which broke and flew across the room, and even though it landed a full ten feet from his wife, she yelled at him as if she were in mortal peril: Hey? I’m standing here? Then Faye blinked and shook her head like someone waking from a trance and looked at him and said, “Huh?”

“You seem stoned,” Samuel said. “Are you high on something right now?”

She nodded. “I took some pills this morning.”

“What pills?”

“Propranolol for blood pressure. Benzodiazepine for excitability. Aspirin. Something else that was originally developed to prevent premature ejaculation in men but is now used for anxiety and insomnia.”

“You do that a lot?”

“Not a lot. You’d be amazed how many beneficial drugs were originally developed to treat sex problems in men. They practically drive the whole pharmaceutical industry. Thank god for male sexual dysfunction.”

“Any reason you needed all that this morning?”

“Simon called. You remember Simon. My lawyer?”

“I remember.”

“He had some news. Apparently the prosecution is expanding their case against me. They added a couple of new charges today. Domestic acts of terrorism. Making terrorist threats. That kind of thing.”

“You’re kidding.”

She picked up a notepad stuck between the couch cushions and read: “Acts dangerous to human life that cause fear, terror, or intimidation, or attempt to influence the policy of a government through intimidation and coercion.”

“That seems like a stretch.”

“Judge Brown convinced the prosecutor to add the new charges. I guess he came in this morning super enthusiastic about putting me in prison for the rest of my life.”

Samuel felt his insides sort of freeze. He knew exactly what spurred the judge’s new zealotry but could not at this moment bear to tell his mom about it.

“So I’m rattled today,” Faye said, “and anxious. Hence the pills.”

“I understand.”

“By the way? Simon tells me I should not be talking to you.”

“I personally question that guy’s legal aptitude, frankly.”

“He suspects your motives.”

“Well,” Samuel said, looking at his shoes. “Thanks for letting me in.”

“I’m surprised you wanted to see me. Especially after the last time you were here. Your meeting with Simon? That couldn’t have been pleasant. I’m sorry.”

Outside, Samuel could hear the squeals of a train coming to a halt, the doors shunting open, the ding-dong warning bell and the automated train voice saying, Doors closing. Samuel realized it was the first time she’d apologized to him for anything.

“Why did you come?” Faye said. “All unannounced and unexpected like this.”

Samuel shrugged. “I don’t know.”

On television, the husband was being interviewed about how he sent his wife to a giant home-improvement store to fetch a tool that does not actually exist: a countertop caliper.

“These people can’t repair their relationship,” Faye said, “so they repair their relationship’s largest metaphor.”

“I need some air,” Samuel said. “How about a walk?”

“Fine.”

He went to her and extended his hand to help her up, and when she took it, when he felt her thin and cold fingers, he realized it was the first time they’d touched in years. The first physical contact between them since she’d kissed his forehead and pressed her face into his hair that morning she left, when he promised to write books and she promised to read them. He had not anticipated feeling anything about this, taking her hand, helping her up. But it made his heart clutch. He did not know he needed this.

“Yeah, my hand is cold,” Faye said. “It’s a side effect of the medication.” She stood and shuffled off to find her shoes.

She seemed to wake up, and her mood seemed to lighten, when they left the apartment. It was a mild and pleasant late-summer day. The streets were for the most part deserted and quiet. They walked east, toward Lake Michigan. His mother explained how real estate in this particular neighborhood was exploding before the recession. This was part of the turn-of-the-century meatpacking and slaughterhouse district. It was abandoned for many years, until recently, when the warehouses had begun their transformation into trendy lofts. But the renovations stalled when the real estate market collapsed. Most developers pulled out. Improvements were abandoned halfway through, buildings stuck mid-transformation. A few of the taller buildings still had cranes standing idle above them. Faye said she used to watch them from her window as they brought up pallets of Sheetrock and concrete. There was a time when every building on the block had one of these cranes.

“Like fishermen over a tiny pond,” she said. “That’s what it looked like.”

But most of the cranes had since been disassembled. Those that still stood hadn’t moved in a couple of years. So the neighborhood remained empty, just on the brink of habitation.